Probably one reason why hot air is so much more prevalent in the US is
air conditioning. With a hot air system the air conditioning condenser
can sit directly atop the furnace and take advantage of the same
ductwork. It's not ideal from an air flow standpoint since the cold air
is entering the rooms from the floor level and must be blown upward
(which just goes to make Ken's point about air flow).
The house previous to this one was a two story design with hot water
baseboard heat. But the house was also air conditioned. It had two
small compressors outside with one condenser in the attic feeding air
ducts into the ceiling on the second floor. The other condenser was in
the basement feeding cold air into floor level ducts similar to a hot
air heating system. Not ideal but much less bother and expense than
trying to feed the air at ceiling level to the first floor.
That house I had custom built in 1995 and was fairly efficient.
Unfortunately, this current house was built in 1958. The hot air
ducting was built to support a mostly empty basement rather than one
containing a workshop, laundry room, partial kitchen, family room, full
bath and guest bedroom. It can be chilly down there at times. The air
conditioner was an add-on about 20 years ago and uses the same old
inefficient ductwork. Which reminds me that the compressor is probably
about 20 years old and perhaps nearing end-of-life as the furnace just did.
Chuck Norcutt
On 12/8/2012 1:30 PM, Chris Barker wrote:
> I hadn't realised, Ken, that hot air heating is so prevalent. When
> once we had hot air heating, in a place called Doncaster, South
> Yorkshire, it was a pretty horrid thing, noisy and dusty.
>
> Chris
>
> On 8 Dec 2012, at 17:39, Ken Norton <ken@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>
>> In our house-hunting adventures over this past year, we
>> encountered MANY houses with very poorly designed central
>> heating/cooling systems. One primary reason is that so many houses
>> have been built on. Another reason is that, frankly, most of these
>> places were built by idiots. The hot water pipes are rarely any
>> better. The place we bought is pretty good in the heating/cooling
>> system (more or less), but pretty rot-gut in regards to the hot
>> water. I'll be adding pipe insulation before putting the suspended
>> ceiling in the darkroom.
>
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